


Not Going Anywhere

by Hello_Spikey



Category: Angel: the Series
Genre: Hurt/Comfort, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-06-08
Updated: 2015-06-08
Packaged: 2019-10-23 21:52:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,674
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17691758
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Hello_Spikey/pseuds/Hello_Spikey
Summary: Stone Cold Wes rescues Spike, then turns into the StayPuft Marshmallow Man once he's taking care of his injuries.





	Not Going Anywhere

**Author's Note:**

  * For [verucasalt123](https://archiveofourown.org/users/verucasalt123/gifts).



> For **verucasalt123** who asked: I'd love to see a Spike/Wes story with Stone Cold Wes who, when he finds out Spike's been kidnapped, turns into the StayPuft Marshmallow Man once he's rescued Spike and is taking care of him and treating his injuries that are slow to heal. Wes should definitely remain Stone Cold Wes during the rescue mission
> 
> And lo! Another overdue mod challenge. I hope you like it!

Spike watched Wesley, carefully wringing a rag and gently washing his wounds, so gentle, the water just the right temperature to warm. His hands were steady and smooth. Spike wanted to ask him questions, but nothing came from his mouth but a pathetic croak.  
  
“Sh,” Wes said. “I know.”  
  
SODDING HELL he didn’t know.  
  
Spike had seen those gentle hands tear across a stout throat scant inches from his face.   
  
Wesley’s face impassive as he buried an ax in another demon’s chest.  
  
Before that, the way he walked into the room, shotgun leveled, and tossed it aside after dispatching the two guards.  
  
That same face flinching when a touch caused Spike to gasp. Wes looked positively frightened, rushing to get a charm against pain.  
  
Don’t, Spike wanted to say. He tried to raise his hand. Wes cast the spell, and immediately, as he knew he would, Spike lost consciousness. The pain was the only thing keeping him awake.  
  
***  
Spike didn’t know how he’d gotten himself into the mess. He’d had a bad night – hadn’t wanted to out-brood Angel so he’d gone on a bender instead and wound up making out with some bloke he wasn’t entirely sure he’d wanted to kiss, but there’d been some missing time and there he was so it was easier to go with the flow, and when the club started closing around them and said bloke said there was a good after-hours place nearby, well, that had seemed just the thing.  
  
And then the club hadn’t really been a club, and Spike found that he was fighting slow-motion, like he was swimming in oil, and the demons, which appeared to be the majority of patrons at said not-club, were having no such difficulties.  
  
When he woke up in chains, it didn’t help to reflect that one should not go drinking while depressed. Still, he expected to be asked questions, if not immediately, soon after the torture started.  
  
They didn’t.  
  
Spike wisecracked and argued and then he tried to bargain. Then all he could do was scream, until the red demon with all the horns crushed his windpipe.  
  
They came and went and some were more inventive and some more sadistic but the greatest torture was not knowing WHY.  
  
Twice he got free. The first time he broke his thumb to slip the cuff – a trick he’d learned long ago. He made it to the door of the room he was in, and hit a magical barrier. He tried to push through it, like swimming through pudding.  
  
Two stone skinned monsters grabbed him and slammed him like a ragdoll into the wall until he stopped moving.  
  
The second time he pretended to pass out. Waited. The torturer came close enough that he latched onto his rubbery neck, pulling down mouthfuls of acidic demon blood.   
  
Using only a demon, friends, and his teeth, he bashed through the stone column his left hand was chained to.  
  
He didn’t even get off the damn stone platform that time, but he was counting it.  
  
They brought in a chorus of demons in brown robes who chanted and spread incense and viscera. New stone columns grew out of the floor and engulfed Spike’s hands and wrists and feet, tight enough to make the bones ache.  
  
Then they put more chains on.  
  
At least the places he was secured couldn’t be cut and burned. He tried to concentrate on that.  
  
He hadn’t expected anyone to come save him. It felt like years had passed, but it couldn’t have been, because Wed hadn’t aged, and there was Wes, kicking in the door. All Spike’s captors appearing at once, against the onslaught. It made Spike wonder, and feel a sick sort of pride, that they fought so hard to keep their prize. He didn’t feel worth a handful of spit at the moment – barely one solid vampire.  
  
Wesley, cold and ruthless, cutting his way through each opponent, not even looking at Spike until the last one fell, but once that happened, looking long and hard, and that hard countenance fading and warm hands pulling him up, feeling the chains.  
  
“There now. I have you. It’s almost over.”  
  
***  
  
Spike woke to the taste of blood in is mouth and almost choked.  
  
“Sh. Easy. Slow. That’s it.” Wesley’s voice. Of course.  
  
The blood soothed his throat. He could feel it working. Enough so that when he’d finished the mug, and Wesley came back with another, he was able to croak, “Where?”  
  
“We’re in my flat.”  
  
Spike shook his head. He tried again. “Where… found…”  
  
“Where did I find you?”  
  
Spike nodded.  
  
Wesley’s face got dangerously still. “A place that doesn’t exist anymore.”  
  
“How…?”  
  
“Don’t concern yourself. It’s over and you’re safe now.”  
  
“Th… tha… ta.”  
  
A tiny smile graced Wesley’s lips. “Don’t mention it. Now, enough chatter. I don’t fancy letting this blood get cold again. It’s difficult to heat it to body temperature without cooking it in my microwave.”  
  
And everything was warmth and care, and Wesley made him finish the blood and then checked his bandages, removing soiled ones and re-wrapping wounds until Spike felt all clean and dry and solid and even the ache of his healing bones was somehow comforting, solid and real.  
  
***  
  
Wesley looked down at Spike, once again sleeping. More peacefully this time, he thought. The horrible gauntness had eased out of his face at last. It had felt like gallons of blood soaked into Spike with no result before.  
  
He didn’t like to think of the way he’d looked, when he first saw him, after infiltrating the inner sanctum, chained on the altar of a god of pain, the well-tended font of a sadistic cult.  
  
He didn’t like to think what Spike would have looked like if Wesley hadn’t been able to trace him there. The cult apparently liked vampire victims for their resilience, and had been salivating over the chance of capturing one of the two vampires with souls, for the belief that the soul would make them suffer more piquantly.  
  
He was not, truth be told, entirely proud of himself for taking the time to chase down every single member of the cult. Not for what he’d done, but that it had slowed Spike’s recovery. With the bloodlust sated and the task complete, all he could see was the long road to healing and curse himself for every minute not spent tending Spike’s health.  
  
He’d always liked Spike – begrudgingly at first, enviously even, for his bravado and easy cool. And he was always beautiful to look at, even when he was a source of fear. Now, though? Through noticing his absence and feeling indignant on his behalf that no one else seemed panicked by it… (“It’s just SPIKE”, Angel had said, as though the mere fact of BEING Spike precluded any harm coming to him.)  
  
Wesley stroked back the messy, brown-rooted locks from Spike’s forehead. Save someone, take responsibility for them, see them vulnerable and reduced and millimeters from annihilation… no wonder he was helplessly smitten.  
  
Only let this erase the image, Wes thought, of the holes in his chest and the bones protruding through skin and the mottled bruises and the seeping pus.  
  
Wesley picked up his shotgun. He felt like hunting again tonight.  
  
***  
  
Spike awoke alone for a change. He felt itching under his bandages, and for once his hand lifted when he tried. He felt along his chest, the cool, dry bandages. He felt the bed. He pressed the mattress and tried to raise himself. Searing pain broke out across his abdomen and his chest. He fell back with a cry.  
  
The door slammed open and a startled Wes ran in.  
  
“’M fine,” Spike gasped. He wriggled his shoulders, trying to back himself up against the pillows and rise that way.  
  
Wesley hurried to his side and set his hands on his shoulders. “Don’t. You’re not well enough, yet.”   
  
Spike stilled. “I’m a sodding vampire, Wes.”  
  
Wesley smiled sadly. “You’re many pieces of vampire, held together with tape. Please let’s not remove the tape.”  
  
Spike closed his eyes. He hated asking anyone for help. It felt impossible. “I’ve been looking at your ceiling for days, Wes.”  
  
Wesley, thankfully, seemed to understand. Strong arms lifted him carefully. Pillows shifted, and despite more pain, Spike sighed with relief to find himself upright enough to look across the room instead of at the ceiling.  
  
“Why?” Spike asked as Wesley fussed with pillows and blankets.  
  
Wesley squinted at hm. “You asked.”  
  
“No. Not that, berk. Why are you nursing me back to health? Why rescue me at all? Angel didn’t send you – I know that. He’s too possessive of everything, even a rescue mission, to let it carry on out of his sight.”  
  
Wesley sat, lightly, on the edge of the bed, his hand resting on Spike’s stomach. “I can’t believe you would even ask such a thing.”  
  
“No, really, the berk is as possessive as a toddler with a lolly.”  
  
Wesley carefully picked up Spike’s right hand – it was the less damaged of the two. His thumbs brushed the unbandaged skin of his palm. “Spike… you know why I rescued you. I came as quickly as I could.”  
  
Spike was unsure if he was worried or just confused by Wesley’s tone. “So… you were bored?”  
  
“No! I… I care about you, you absolute WANKER.”  
  
Spike smiled. “Oh you sweet talker.”  
  
“Apparently I’m awfully fond of thick-headed vampires. And of course I rescued you. Anyone would. Should. You’re a hero, and a good man.”  
  
It took Spike a long time to realize he was staring in open-mouthed shock, and he feared the warmth on his cheeks might be a blush, which was even worse. He shook his head. “You’ll turn my head, Wes, and then where will I be?”  
  
“Right here, if I have anything to say about it.” Wesley leaned forward and kissed Spike on the lips.  
  
Even Spike was smart enough to stop arguing at that point. “Just your luck I wasn’t planning on going anywhere,” he said.  
  
The end.


End file.
